Towards a Better Past: Found[ing] Identity in Architecture Aotearoa

Abstract

In this thesis investigations based around the New Zealand state house and the wharenui aim to analytically dissect their respective structural and social compositions in order to activate conscious decisions around what to leave in the glazed museum case of the past and what to take forward; that people may better “carry on history for the purposes of living!”§ Besides the ‘elegant shed’, a notable portion of New Zealand’s architectural history is bound to government/corporation housing. The un-success stories around examples of state housing relate to areas where a ghetto is created, and poor architecture becomes part of a poor-cycle. Architecture has a role in this; cycles are not easy to break, but if it can be held at least partly responsible for a negative effect here, then it is a good place to look to achieve the opposite. Through dis-mantling the dichotomistic typologies of the wharenui and the state house, simultaneously attacking symptomatic stereotypes, and attempting to re-establish key associated values at a syntactical level; the ambition is that new architectural relationships will be formed. It is hoped this will allow for such architecture to be viewed as temporally connected to past, present, and future, and coincidentally enabling the creation of an inaugural identity. Toward a Better Past aims to approach and provoke architectural modus operandi and solutions beneficial to Māori and non-Māori alike, generating housing as a responsive part of home.